At the same time, bloggers, Tweeple and cable-TV bloviators could not stop talking about the separate comments of a current member of the Supreme Court and of a former judge.

The sitting jurist is Justice Anthony Kennedy, whose enigmatic notions of liberty will likely spell the fate of President Obama's signature measure, the Affordable Care Act, including its provision of medical coverage to uninsured children.

The ex-judge, once a Virginia magistrate, is Robert Zimmerman, father of the man who slayed 17-year-old, Skittles-armed Trayvon Martin. Magistrate Zimmerman enraged many by observing, implausibly, that he is tired of "all the hate" coming from President Obama, apparently referring to the pitch-perfect, hate-free and only remarks of the President on Trayvon's death. As the Washington Post reported, President Obama said:

I can only imagine what these parents are going through . . . And I think every parent in America should be able to understand why it is absolutely imperative that we investigate every aspect of this, and that everybody pulls together — federal, state and local — to figure out exactly how this tragedy happened . . . If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon . . . When I think about this boy, I think about my own kids.

Also last week, the Director of USCIS, Alejandro Mayorkas, spoke poignantly (even more intimately than in his earlier writings) of the losses and sacrifices his parents endured as they gave their children unimagined opportunities in America. He recalled an indomitable father who lost his livelihood and property in Castro's Cuba and yet built a new business in faraway California. He remembered a loyal, loving mother who came here as a refugee but would not rest until his brothers joined them in America.

Love of children, however, only goes so far within the Beltway. Children raised in America but born on the wrong side of an arbitrary, human-drawn boundary are not recipients of otherwise bountiful political love. As several child lobbyists (U.S. citizens all), mustering arguments for the DREAM Act, told legislators and staffers alike last week, "it's the moral thing to do." These under-age advocates, however, didn't rely solely on the heart and soul. Citing a RAND study, they also pitched arguments to the head, noting that the economic benefits of giving DREAMers legal status would be a net economic plus for America.

Their petitions, though politely received, seemed mostly to fall on deaf ears. The Capital cognoscenti all acknowledge that there is no chance for a vote on the DREAM Act before November's election.

Trying to put lipstick on this homely pig, a senior ICE official claimed at a bar gathering last week that the PD program, though in its infancy, is proving successful. I challenged him, noting that none of the members of ICE's union, constituting the bulk of ICE's 7000-person workforce -- have taken PD training. Another lawyer agreed, recounting the words of an ICE officer who told her, "I'm a deportation officer, not a discretion officer." Undaunted, the senior ICE official responded that, though the union members make the arrests, ICE supervisors and managers decide on grants or refusals of PD. Still, the fact remains, as ICE admits, that only 1% of detained immigrants and 8% of those in removal proceedings have been given PD.

Worse yet, PD by itself, without a companion grant of deferred action status (which offers a path to a work permit), is no more protective of a DREAMer's well being than snake oil. A PD grant without deferred action status allows the grantee one hard-hearted benefit -- the opportunity to vegetate in America, like a bromeliad, on thin air.

Administration defenders of the PD-only policy say that deferred action is the most precious form of PD, requiring multi-level signoff within ICE. Similarly, at USCIS deferred action can only be granted on the recommendation of a Field Office Director and the approval of a Regional Director. Astonishingly, according to Congressional staff and agency insiders, the USCIS units that decide the vast majority of applications for immigration benefits (the Regional Service Centers in Vermont, Texas, California and Nebraska) have no authority to grant deferred action.

If President Obama really cares deeply about children, he must do more than applaud his Justice Department for its proper decision to investigate the senseless killing of Trayvon Martin. He must also explain what "every parent in America should be able to understand" and show "why it is absolutely imperative" that we not waste our DREAMers' young lives.

The President should also order ICE and USCIS to grant deferred action status generously, with less reliance on time-consuming case-by-case analysis and instead on an approach that is more quick and predictable. Perhaps, the method for determining deferred-action eligibility could be a presumptive yes-or-no decision based on a point system whereby values or demerits are calculated in alignment with the positive and negative factors identified in the June, 2011 Morton Memorandum. The point system should feature a two-way override. ICE should have discretion where warranted to overturn a presumptive "yes," and the person seeking deferred-action should be allowed to present evidence and seek to reverse a presumptive "no." This presupposes that we eliminate the charade that deferred action cannot be requested but merely is something that dawns on an immigration officer once s/he has stumbled upon facts warranting this act of administrative grace and convenience.

The case-by-case, PD-only policy has failed. At best, it has helped a tiny number of people to try and live as air plants in America. USCIS (and ICE, for those in immigration proceedings) should charge a filing fee to cover the cost of considering applicant-generated requests for deferred action. In these times of budgetary constraint, this is the only way to resolve the problem of large numbers of unauthorized persons with positive traits and abiding ties to this country who present no danger and are too numerous to deport at an affordable cost.

* * *

As my week in Washington ended, I couldn't help but note the plentiful examples of our nation's founding, an action based on the same moral principles of "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" as cited by the junior high students who last week urged passage of the DREAM Act. America's seminal document, the Declaration of Independence, as Alex Nowrasteh of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, noted last week ("The Founders' Immigration Policy"), remains alive today. Our forebears, in announcing their separation from England, explained that severance of common citizenship with the British was necessary because the American colonists had "appealed to [the British people's] native justice and magnanimity" to reverse the "usurpations" of King George III, but nonetheless they "have been deaf to the voice of justice."

Oh son of a Kenyan and son of Cubans, be not deaf to the voice of justice. If you could adopt more children, they should look like our DREAMers.

Comments

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